Copyrighted Collections as Data Idea Lab

This Idea Lab session, prompted by the presenter’s planning for an IMLS-sponsored National Forum on copyrighted collections as data, asks participants to consider the feasibility of developing computationally accessible collections within and across their institutions. We will introduce different models for provisioning copyrighted collections as data, ranging from high-resource, controlled access data capsules to downloadable extracted features .csv files aligned with minimal computing. We will also explore the distinctive user needs that animate these projects, both for curators of copyrighted data, and for researchers. What shared possibilities can we identify, particularly working across Texas digital libraries, for building and sharing thematic collections of copyrighted material? What are our researchers and students seeking to learn from computational access to these collections of contemporary culture? In addition to imagining the wide-ranging possibilities, this Idea Lab will focus on questions of implementation by encouraging a clear-eyed understanding of the obstacles and barriers to this work.